Book accuses voters for failing to vet aspiring leaders

File | NATION
Nobel Peace Prize winner and world renowned environmentalist Wangari Maathai died addresses delegates at a past conference. She died died of ovarian cancer on September 25, 2011.

In Ken Saro Wiwa’s moving story, “Africa Kills Her Sun,” a man is about to be shot by a firing squad. As the dying man thinks about the kind of memory he would like to leave behind, he remembers many sad things. He remembers reading once about a lonely man who wanted to be buried “along with his walking stick – his faithful companion over the years. He was pictured slumping in death, devotedly clutching his beloved walking stick”.

The narrator also remembers reading a story in a newspaper as a child, of an “African leader who stood on the grave of a dead lieutenant and, through his tears, said, ‘Africa kills her sons’”.

Thinking of his own impending death, the narrator says, “Not that I care. To die the way I’m going to die in the next hour or two is really nothing to worry about. I’m in excellent company. I should find myself recorded in the annals of our (African) history. A history of violence, of murder, of disregard for life. Pleasure in inflicting pain – sadism. It’s a world I should be pleased to leave. But not without an epitaph”.

Africa kills her sons

He thinks of ‘‘Africa kills her sons’’ as the appropriate words for his epitaph but modifies them slightly: “I’d like you to put this on my gravestone, as my epitaph: ‘Africa Kills Her Sun’. A good epitaph, eh? Cryptic. Definite. A stroke of genius, I should say. I am sure you’ll agree with me.

‘Africa Kills Her Sun!’ That’s why she’d been described as the Dark Continent? Yes? ... so now … I’m done. I hear the prison guard jangle his keys … my time expires and I must send you my love … goodbye”. Ken Saro Wiwa’s story is bleak.

However, in a new book, The Challenge for Africa, Nobel laureate Professor Wangari Maathai resists the bleak mood. Prof Maathai is candid and discusses the challenges facing Africa but she refuses to write an epitaph.

She tackles one of the major issues threatening to shatter many African states – the issues of ethnicity and identity. Chapters 9 and 10 are the ones that Kenyans should be very keen not only to read but also to glean wisdom from. In those chapters, she delves more deeply into the challenges of the African nation-state, what she calls ‘‘micro-nation’’.

She writes, “for decades, Africans have belittled or ignored the fundamental cultural and psychological importance of micro-national identity, instead using ethnicity for political gain. I call on Africans to rediscover and embrace their linguistic, cultural and ethnic diversity, not only so their nation-states can move forward politically and economically, but so that they may heal a psyche wounded by denial of who they really are.”

At a time when Kenya is trying to heal from deep ethnic divisions, Prof Maathai’s wisdom is welcome. Prof Maathai places the blame not only on our leaders but also on us – for allowing ourselves to be taken on a ride in the wrong bus without questioning our ‘‘drivers’’.

In one of her lashes, she writes: “I developed a concept that I call ‘The Wrong Bus Syndrome.’ Like travellers who have boarded the wrong bus, many people and communities are heading in the wrong direction or travelling on the wrong path, while allowing others (often their leaders) to lead them further from their desired destination. It is my analysis that much of Africa today is on the wrong bus”.

How true! We let our leaders, often for reasons of ethnicity, to lead us away from our desired destination. We rarely demand any transparency or accountability from political leaders from our own communities. They are never closely scrutinised because to us, they are always angels. They could be corrupt, hateful and absolutely immoral but they will continue winning election after election.

Common mother tongue

As long as we share a common mother tongue with them, whether they have the required values or vision is immaterial. We will defend them, take up arms and die for them because we believe other communities want to ‘‘finish us’’ by targeting our tribal chiefs.

The consequence is that we end up having unexamined leaders. It is high time we vetted our leaders before allowing them to eat off our sweaty backs. This will ensure that only leaders with the best qualities – peaceful, visionary and empathetic – ascend to the high calling that is leadership.

To stress the importance of peace in any society, Prof Maathai uses the traditional African three-legged stool as a metaphor for what she views as the three important components of a stable society: sustainable environmental management, democratic governance, and a culture of peace.

“Those legs are chiselled by a craftsman …[who] chisels all the three legs at the same time, in order to create a balance … If we don’t have these three legs, no matter who comes, and with whatever [loans or aid], we shall never develop.”

If we take Prof Maathai’s advice, we will neither kill our sons nor our suns – and we will also shine with the brightness of the firmament of enlightenment like other continents have.

The writer is the publishing manager at Macmillan Kenya Publishers.